Dark clouds hang over air shows after budget cuts

“People are very bitter now,” he said. “I’m very saddened by everything that’s going on because we’ve worked hard to get to where we are, and we’ve been shut down by no fault of our own.”

Air show announcer Rob Reider, of Cincinnati, lost half his season, which is his primary source of income. “Am I angry? Yes, because it’s hurting me,” he said. “If something doesn’t brighten up by the end of this year, I’ll be looking to do other things and air shows will become a backburner business.”

The losses carry on down the line to the concessionaires who feed spectators, vendors who provide hundreds of portable toilets, rental car companies that supply vehicles, hotels that house pilots and crews, and providers of aviation fuel.

In Brunswick, the canceled Great State of Maine Air Show had a budget of about $750,000. Last year’s show paid out $31,000 for motel rooms for Air Force Thunderbirds team alone.

“It’s a little issue on a national level, but it’s a big issue locally. It’s a big weekend for us,” said Steve Levesque, executive director of the agency that organizes the show. “A lot of people were angry that we shut it down, but we didn’t have any other choice.”

For Reider and the pilots like Tucker and Wagstaff, the air shows cancellations mean losses that aren’t easily calculated.

The shows tend to inspire young people, serve as a demonstration and recruiting tool for the military, and provide wholesome entertainment for families, they said.

“The metaphor of flight is about pushing boundaries; that’s what we do as Americans,” Tucker said. “It really disappoints me that because of politics, opportunities to be patriotic have been lost to millions and millions of people. What’s the price of that?”